\n\t\their real life was about to slip into fantasy, which was pretty much the plan. At the tail end of the 1960s, Roger Taylor<\/a> and Freddie Bulsara would lie on the floor together, head to head, getting lost in Electric Ladyland<\/a>, talking about their future. Maybe they\u2019d share a bottle of wine, nothing stronger. \u201cFred and I were no good at smoking weed,\u201d Taylor says, more than five decades later. \u201cI used to think my head was on fire at the back. It never did agree.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n\tEven before Bulsara joined the band that became Queen<\/a> and renamed himself Freddie Mercury<\/a>, he and Taylor shared a velvet-heavy fashion sense, a passion for Jimi Hendrix, and some fat-bottomed ambitions. \u201cWe wanted to be the best,\u201d says Taylor. \u201cWe both really wanted success.\u201d Queen\u2019s drummer is, at the moment, sitting in a vast living room on his 18th-century estate in the British countryside, amid 48 wooded acres. He might not have made it here without the song we\u2019re here to discuss, the moment Queen reached as far as any band ever dared, then went a bit further, and then added a few more \u201cGalileos\u201d for good measure: \u201cBohemian Rhapsody<\/a>,\u201d which is about to celebrate its 50th anniversary.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tThe track, first played on U.K. radio in October 1975 and squeezed onto a seven-\u00adinch single at the end of that month, has become the most-streamed song from the 20th century, with more than 2.8 billion plays on Spotify alone. \u201cIncredible,\u201d Brian May<\/a> says when I visit him the next day. \u201c\u2018Bohemian Rhapsody\u2019 doesn\u2019t get old, does it? And I suppose that\u2019s the magic for us. We\u2019re lucky that we don\u2019t get old.\u201d He pauses and makes a slight correction. \u201cThe music doesn\u2019t seem to get old.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe statistic leaves little doubt: Queen\u2019s biggest song is on its way to becoming the rock era\u2019s most lasting artifact, Figaro, Beelzebub, and all. \u201cBohemian Rhapsody\u201d is a five-minute-and-54-second remnant of a brief slice of time when musicians could afford to spend weeks slathering overdubs onto a single track, when engineers made edits with a razor on magnetic tape, when bands raced to push the limits of song structure and recording technology, and maybe when, as Taylor caustically argues, \u201cyou actually had to be good at your instrument \u2014 that doesn\u2019t seem to be a necessary requisite these days.\u201d Even as Queen labored over \u201cRhapsody\u201d and the rest of their fourth album, A Night at the Opera, the clock was ticking. Two weeks before the album\u2019s release, the Sex Pistols played their first show in London.<\/p>\n \t\tEditor\u2019s picks<\/p>\n \n <\/p>\n \n\t(To hear an audio documentary version of this article on our Rolling Stone Music Now podcast, press play above, or go to Apple Podcasts<\/a> or Spotify<\/a>.)<\/p>\n \n\tThe song is also, of course, an eternal encapsulation of the brilliance, wit, and pain of its lead voice and composer, Freddie Mercury, who died of complications from AIDS in 1991 when he was just 45. \u201cIn certain areas, we feel that we want to go overboard,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s what keeps us going really, darling.\u2026 We\u2019re probably the fussiest band in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\tCover image by \u00a9Mick Rock\/Estate of Mick Rock. Motion design by Sara K. Afridi. Image within video by Fin Costello\/Redferns\/Getty Images; Andrew Putler\/Redferns\/Getty Images; Watal Asanuma\/Shinko Music\/Getty Images, 7; \u00a9 Queen Productions Ltd; Johnny Dewe Mathews\/\u00a9 Queen Productions Ltd\t<\/p>\n \n\tOn a pleasant late-spring morning, Taylor\u2019s side doors are flung open to his sprawling garden. Somewhere out there, not quite in sight, is a 20-foot-high fiberglass statue of Mercury that once advertised the We Will Rock You musical. Taylor is positive his late friend would\u2019ve found its new home hilarious. Elsewhere among the greenery is the very same 60-inch gong we hear Taylor strike in the final seconds of \u201cRhapsody.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cI remember Led Zeppelin had a gong,\u201d Taylor says with a smirk. \u201cSo we had a much bigger gong. Pathetic one-up\u00admanship, really.\u201d <\/p>\n \t\tRelated Content<\/p>\n \n\tHis formerly blond hair is silver now, cropped short, with a matching beard, and he dresses like a retired mogul these days, in slim khakis and a gray button-down. Nearby is a grand piano, with a piece of paper bearing a scribbled, in-progress chord progression; behind him are books on the Beatles and Bob Dylan.<\/p>\n \n\tIn 1969, Taylor played drums in a band called Smile alongside May, a brilliant, meticulous, curly-headed fellow Hendrix disciple, while Bulsara sang in the short-lived Ibex. The members of the two groups crammed into a series of London flats together, and all the while, Bulsara was trying to make his way into Smile. He was by no means an obvious choice. \u201cThe honest truth,\u201d says Taylor, \u201cis he was not a great singer at the time. He had this very powerful but uncontrolled sort of noise.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tQueen at Ridge Farm in 1975: May, Deacon, Mercury, a canine friend and Taylor<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\u00a9 QUEEN PRODUCTIONS LTD.\/HOLLYWOOD RECORDS<\/p>\n \n\tFreddie kept a Hendrix photo on his bedroom mirror, drew pictures of him in his ruffled stage outfits, and saw him in concert at least 14 times. Hendrix was \u201cliving out everything I wanted to be,\u201d he\u2019d say later, not mentioning that Jimi was also an exception to rock stardom\u2019s usual whiteness, a barrier he\u2019d break as well. Bulsara was desperate to transform himself in that mold, to erase his recent past as a gawky, shy, bucktoothed kid\u200a. He rarely spoke of his highly particular background, a childhood of relative privilege in the British colony of Zanzibar, with Parsi parents who subscribed to the ancient faith of Zoroastrianism. (Like most ancient faiths, it\u2019s never been big on queerness.) He spent ages eight through 16 at an elite boarding school in India, and he and his family fled to the U.K. in 1964 after a revolution in Zanzibar threw off British rule.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tAs the Seventies began, Smile singer Tim Staffell quit, and Freddie officially joined the band, rechristening it Queen, to Taylor and May\u2019s initial discomfort. The name was intended \u201cin the regal sense,\u201d Mercury would insist, not always convincingly. But what seems wildly obvious now about his sexuality was often less so in the early days, maybe even to the singer himself. Mercury met Mary Austin, who became his longtime girlfriend, in 1970, and she wasn\u2019t the first woman his bandmates saw him date. At most, May has said, they had a \u201cslight suspicion\u201d about the truth.<\/p>\n \n\tBy that summer, Freddie found his new last name, inspired by a line about \u201cMother Mercury\u201d in \u201cMy Fairy King,\u201d a song on Queen\u2019s debut LP. \u201cFreddie kind of made himself,\u201d Taylor says. \u201cHe just forged this person, Freddie Mercury, out of seeming nowhere.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe uncanny vocal blend that hit its peak on \u201cRhapsody\u201d was born in echoey caverns on the coasts of England, during frequent visits to Taylor\u2019s native Cornwall. Even before Staffell\u2019s departure, May, Mercury, and Taylor started to sing in three-part harmony there. \u201cWe used to go into the caves and just sing stuff,\u201d May says. \u201cWe kind of wallowed in the sound, this beautiful blend of harmonies. \u00adParticularly Freddie and I, I suppose, shared that passion.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tQueen\u2019s final lineup wouldn\u2019t cement itself until the following year, when bassist John Deacon joined, but they had already discovered the kind of music they wanted to make. \u201cOur vision for Queen,\u201d says May, \u201cwas you had this heaviness, this sort of power and exciting structure in the backing track, but above it was all this beautiful melody and harmony. So you got it all. That\u2019s what we were looking for.\u201d When May caught an early concert by prog-rock giants Yes, with their fusion of twisty riffs and Crosby, Stills, and Nash-inspired harmonies, he thought, \u201cWell, that comes close.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIn December 1969, May, Mercury, and Taylor all went to see the Who play their then-new album Tommy at the London Coliseum. It was another piece of the map to their future \u2014 maybe not operatic rock, but a surging, bombastic rock opera, to be sure. Taylor still thinks the studio Tommy was underproduced, smaller-sounding than the Who\u2019s onstage versions. That was one criticism no one would ever apply to his own band. (As May sees it, the Who\u2019s earlier work was more of an influence: \u201cTommy\u2018s a bit late in our development,\u201d he says.)<\/p>\n \n\tMay and Taylor were also struck by the unearthly conglomeration of voices on another new piece of music from that year, the Beatles\u2019 \u201cBecause.\u201d \u201cWe were transfixed,\u201d says May. \u201cI can feel the shivers going up my spine. We thought, \u2018Oh, my God, that has to be the most daring piece of pure harmony we\u2019ve ever heard.\u2019\u201d\u00a0To create a choral effect, the Beatles stacked their voices in multiple layers, a technique May, Taylor, and Mercury would soon push much further. \u200aBut Queen were just as influenced by tracks as early as 1964\u2019s \u201cThis Boy,\u201d and before that, the Beatles\u2019 own heroes, from Buddy Holly to the Everly Brothers. \u201cIt was everything the Beatles did,\u201d May says. \u201cWe were able to sort of take up where the Beatles left off.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe thought, \u2018well, this is kind of ridiculous, so let\u2019s go.\u2019 We really enjoyed the silliness of it.\u201d<\/p>\n Roger Taylor<\/p>\n \n\tTHEY\u2019VE HAD 50 YEARS to ponder it, but May and Taylor still haven\u2019t nailed down what Mercury was singing about on \u201cBohemian Rhapsody.\u201d \u201cSadly, we can\u2019t ask Freddie,\u201d Taylor says. The members of Queen never discussed their lyrics with one another, and Mercury was hardly eager to offer explanations. \u201cPeople still ask me what \u2018Bohemian Rhapsody\u2019 is all about,\u201d he said years later, \u201cand I say I don\u2019t know.\u201d Any revelation, he suggested, \u201closes the myth and ruins a kind of mystique that people have built\u00a0 up.\u201d His late friend Kenny Everett, the DJ who debuted the song, said Mercury privately went as far as to dismiss the whole thing as \u201crhyming nonsense.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tJohn Reid, who became Queen\u2019s manager in mid-1975, just before they began work on A Night at the Opera, was openly gay, and happened to be dating another client, Elton John. After Reid mentioned his own sexuality over dinner, Mercury casually came out to him. Mercury was still living with Mary Austin, but spending his evenings at the gay club Rods, where he met a young man named David Minns and began an affair. Reid is convinced that a widespread theory about \u201cBohemian Rhapsody\u201d is correct, that the song is fundamentally about Mercury coming to terms with his sexual identity. A line like \u201cGotta leave you all behind and face the truth\u201d all but begs for that reading. \u201cI think that\u2019s the key to it,\u201d Reid says, \u201cand a little bit of self-doubt, and the fact that he could never be that open to his parents.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tAs Minns once wrote, Mercury \u201cwas tormented by some form of guilt that he had about his past life.\u201d Those feelings seem to define \u201cRhapsody,\u201d so much of which is addressed to \u201cMama.\u201d It\u2019s tempting to see the man shot dead in the opening lines as a stand-in for the end of Mercury\u2019s pose as a straight man, even if he apparently began writing that lyric in the late Sixties. \u201cHe was saying goodbye to that life,\u201d Reid says. (Mercury sometimes described himself as bisexual rather than gay, a label that could be supported by a new book\u2019s claims he sired a \u201csecret daughter\u201d circa 1976. Reid simply doesn\u2019t believe the story, however, or even the idea that Mercury could\u2019ve hidden it. \u201c\u200aThe whole thing is completely ridiculous,\u201d he says. \u201cThere were too many people that knew what Freddie was up to within his circle.\u201d Taylor and May declined to comment on the book.)<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tTea time at Ridge Farm, July 1975: Deacon, May, Mercury and Taylor (from left).<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tWatal Asanuma\/Shinko Music\/Getty Images<\/p>\n \n\tFor Taylor, almost all speculation about \u201cBohemian Rhapsody\u201d is \u201coverinterpretation.\u201d \u201cHe was writing a fairly intense, ruminative song,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd then we put all these amazingly daft bits in the middle. So many people have been wondering, \u2018What\u2019s the secret meaning?\u2019 I\u2019m not sure there is one. I think what\u2019s there is plain, and the rest of it is nonsensical in a sort of Lewis Carroll way. \u2018Beelzebub has a devil put aside for me.\u2019 For me, it\u2019s all nice imagery, really. I wouldn\u2019t go too much further.\u201d (\u201cIt doesn\u2019t necessarily mean I study demonology and things,\u201d Mercury once said. \u201cI just love the word Beelzebub! Great word, isn\u2019t it?\u201d)<\/p>\n \n\tMay, who has a habit of speaking of his long-gone friend in the present tense, is less certain about it all. \u201cHe\u2019s creating something beautiful in his mind,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd he\u2019s using everything that\u2019s in his mind. He\u2019s using his pain, his frustration, his confusion. It\u2019s not very literal. It\u2019s not very conscious. If you listen to \u2018My Fairy King,\u2019 is that part of his inner fantasy in the same way?\u201d (\u201cSomeone \u2026 [has] broken my fairy circle ring\/And shamed the king in all his pride,\u201d Mercury sang on that one. \u201cI cannot run\/I cannot hide.\u201d) \u201cIt\u2019s equally oblique. Freddie doesn\u2019t feel the need to explain himself, or be direct. \u200aSometimes he loves the way his voice sounds doing those syllables. It\u2019s all jumbled up in a sort of joy of creation. That\u2019s the way I see Freddie.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIn the middle section, some kind of battle is clearly underway, with our hero\u2019s body and soul at stake, and a \u201cmonstrosity\u201d in pursuit. But any lyrical intensity is undercut, to say the least, by the playfulness of Mercury\u2019s vocals and the gleefully absurd operatic bits. A recently auctioned handwritten draft of the song, scribbled in pencil on airline stationery, suggests that \u201cscaramouche,\u201d \u201cFigaro,\u201d \u201cGalileo,\u201d \u201cmagnifico,\u201d and \u201cfandango\u201d came from brainstorming Italianate or opera-associated words, with more concern for sound and rhyme than meaning. Mercury also wrote down \u201cbelladonna,\u201d \u201ccastanetta,\u201d and \u201cbarcaraola\u201d (he probably meant \u201cbarcarolle\u201d) among other options. Without all of that whimsical counterpoint, he might not have allowed the glimpse of the abyss that precedes it, one that somehow still breezes by some listeners: \u201cI sometimes wish I\u2019d never been born at all.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tMercury was proud to acknowledge that he conducted some research into opera for the song, without ever going into specifics. \u201cSomething like \u2018Bohemian Rhapsody\u2019 didn\u2019t just come out of thin air,\u201d he said. Childhood piano lessons gave him some previous knowledge of classical music, and even the name he chose for the song winks at that world. The same auctioned lyric sheets show Mercury first considered, then crossed out, the tongue-in-cheek title \u201cMongolian Rhapsody,\u201d almost certainly a twist on Franz Liszt\u2019s Hungarian Rhapsodies. (When a tuxedoed Bugs Bunny plops down at a piano to perform \u201cHungarian Rhapsody No. 2\u201d in the legendary 1946 short Rhapsody Rabbit, he throws in a reference to a character from one of Mozart\u2019s operas: Figaro.)<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tMercury at Ridge Farm, July 1975<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tWatal Asanuma\/Shinko Music\/Getty Images<\/p>\n \n\tMercury was well aware of the uniqueness of his project. \u201cIf you really listen to the operatic bit, there are no comparisons, which is what we want,\u201d he said. \u201cBut we don\u2019t set out to be outrageous \u2013 it\u2019s in us.\u201d At moments \u2014 magnifico! \u2014 the song veers all the way into comedy, with camp self-awareness that eludes, for instance, 1971\u2019s \u201cStairway to Heaven,\u201d which is quite solemn about the bustles in its hedgerows. \u201cI think it\u2019s healthy to have that kind of sense of humor about what you do,\u201d says May. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t mean you\u2019re not serious.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cWe thought, \u2018Well, this is kind of ridiculous, so let\u2019s go,\u2019\u201d adds Taylor. \u201cWe really enjoyed the silliness of it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tBRIAN MAY HAD A MASTERPIECE in his head, and he couldn\u2019t quite get it right. In mid-1975, he began writing a lengthy prog-rock journey with an intricate structure, freaky vocal effects, and explosive peaks. But it definitely wasn\u2019t \u201cBohemian Rhapsody.\u201d In the earliest stages of A Night at the Opera, Queen decamped to Ridge Farm, an hour outside of London, to get some writing done. They were fresh escapees from a management deal that left them impoverished and in debt, even after scoring a huge hit with 1974\u2019s \u201cKiller Queen.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cWe were incredibly poor,\u201d says May. \u201cWe had nothing. Everybody thought we were rolling in it.\u201d He recalls the band\u2019s old manager, the late Norman Sheffield, quibbling over new drumsticks for Taylor, and refusing to buy Mercury a new piano. But Reid, their new manager, persuaded EMI Records to advance enough money to allow the band to create without limits for the first time. He told them to go off and handle the music while he dealt with their old contracts. In his memoir, Sheffield claimed the band were about to get a big payday either way, but left because Mercury was impatient. The singer savaged Sheffield on A Night at the Opera\u2019s \u201cDeath on Two Legs,\u201d howling, \u201cYou suck my blood like a leech,\u201d and the manager filed a quickly settled libel suit.<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tMay playing his Red Special at Ridge Farm, July 1975.<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tWatal Asanuma\/Shinko Music\/Getty Images<\/p>\n \n\tAt the farm, May continued to struggle with his ambitions for his track \u201cProphet\u2019s Song,\u201d a warning to \u201cpeople of the earth,\u201d based on an apocalyptic dream, that would turn out to be two minutes longer than \u201cRhapsody.\u201d He was feeling blocked as he recovered from an ulcer, and it didn\u2019t necessarily help that one of his bandmates was having a lot more luck. Queen is one of the only major rock bands where every single member wrote hit singles over the years, but they didn\u2019t get there without some friction. \u201cWe were quite competitive, of course,\u201d May says, softly. \u201c\u200aI could hear Freddie hammering away at \u2018Bohemian Rhapsody.\u2019 \u200aWe\u2019re all in separate rooms, doing our bits of writing. He\u2019s got a piano in the yard someplace outdoors, and I can hear him thrashing away, and it\u2019s getting more and more complex and more and more frenetic. And I\u2019m thinking, ahhhhh. I have this vision for \u2018Prophet\u2019s Song,\u2019 but I can\u2019t bring it to life. It was a difficult time for me.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tMay is in a garage-like carriage house on his own country estate, not far from Taylor\u2019s. He\u2019s sitting at a simple wooden table in a little room he swears is bigger than the apartment he shared with his girlfriend just before recording A Night at the Opera. There\u2019s a few astronomy-themed photos on the walls, along with plaques celebrating sales milestones for May\u2019s composition \u201cWe Will Rock You\u201d and Queen\u2019s Greatest Hits. His hair, gray now but still the same curly mop, is wet from a morning swim. \u200a\u201cI had some physical problems,\u201d he says, an understated allusion to a stroke he suffered last August that temporarily impaired his guitar playing. \u201cAnd it seems to make a huge difference, working out.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tA badge on May\u2019s jacket commemorates the NASA space probe New Horizons\u2019 2015 flyby of Pluto, to which \u2014 rather incredibly \u2014 he contributed data analysis. In 2007, he completed his astrophysics Ph.D., decades after appalling his family by leaving it behind for Queen. \u201cMy dad said, \u2018You are throwing your life away,\u2019\u201d May says. His father still felt that way by 1975, which only added to the band\u2019s general sense about A Night at the Opera: \u201cIt was make or break,\u201d Taylor says.<\/p>\n \n\tMay lights up when I mention my fondness for \u201cProphet\u2019s Song,\u201d which, to be fair, has always had its fans, including Mercury, who once mentioned it as a possible single. Rolling Stone had a rocky relationship with Queen in those days \u2014 the otherwise brilliant critic Dave Marsh called them \u201cthe first truly fascist rock band\u201d in 1979, in what now feels like a baffling overreaction to \u201cWe Will Rock You\u201d \u2014 but our review of A Night at the Opera was positive. Somehow, though, it didn\u2019t mention \u201cBohemian Rhapsody\u201d at all, instead naming \u201cProphet\u2019s Song\u201d as the LP\u2019s best track. \u200a\u201cIt\u2019s the shadowy other universe really, that song,\u201d May says. \u201cIt\u2019s never got that much attention, because of the behemoth on the other side.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tMay, Taylor and Mercury recording A Night At The Opera at Scorpio Sound in 1976<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tWatal Asanuma\/Shinko Music\/Getty Images<\/p>\n \n\tAs May overheard the birth of \u201cBohemian Rhapsody,\u201d he couldn\u2019t help turning his attention from his own song to Mercury\u2019s. Guitar orchestrations and solos started brewing. \u201cThe idea for all the instrumental stuff in \u2018Rhapsody\u2019 was growing while I was listening to him developing the song,\u201d he says. \u201cFreddie had some amazingly lateral thought processes. \u200aIt was always easier for me to play on his songs than mine, \u2019cause there was so much stimulation coming.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe winding, heavy riff after the opera section, the one that would give the song one of its many second lives when Mike Myers and Dana Carvey headbanged to it in 1992\u2019s Wayne\u2019s World, was Mercury\u2019s own invention. It never felt quite right under May\u2019s fingers. \u201c\u2018Bohemian Rhapsody\u2019 is never that easy to play, even after all these years,\u201d he says. \u201cI still have to keep my wits about me or I\u2019ll fall off the train.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tQueen next headed to Rockfield Studios, on another farm, this one in Wales, to begin recording. The basic tracks \u2014 drums, bass, piano \u2014 came quickly. Mercury embedded the melodies for the operatic bits in his piano parts, with his percussive performance driving the momentum. \u201cForget about the ridiculous outfits, the showmanship,\u201d says Taylor. \u201cFirst and foremost, he was a brilliant musician. That becomes totally camouflaged by the outrageous-frontman thing.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tFrom there, the band bounced between multiple studios in London, a move that helped promote the myth that A Night at the Opera was \u201cthe most expensive album ever made.\u201d Reid, who would know, says that\u2019s nonsense. \u201cThere was no waste,\u201d Reid says. \u201cThey weren\u2019t wasteful musicians.\u2026 I\u2019m sure the Stones spent more.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI remember Led Zeppelin had a gong,\u201d Taylor says with a smirk. \u201cSo we had a much bigger gong. Pathetic one-upmanship, really.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tFortunately for Queen, studios didn\u2019t charge by the overdub. \u201cI think between the three of us we re-created a sort of 160- to 200-piece-choir effect,\u201d said Mercury, who somehow kept the entire arrangement in his head \u2014 at most, he scribbled down notation for some of the harmony parts. They worked on the operatic section alone for three weeks straight, including weekends, with the band collaborating with producer Roy Thomas Baker (who died earlier this year) and the late engineer Mike Stone.\u200a \u201c\u200aThe fact that certain bits are only sung at certain times and that they would appear and disappear?\u201d says Gary Langan, the sessions\u2019 assistant engineer. \u201cThat\u2019s unfathomable to me to have that all in your head.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cIt seemed to go on forever,\u201d says Taylor. \u201c\u200aThe way we would do it, all three of us would sing every part, which gave it a real thickness, a body.\u201d The exceptions, as shown in the 2018 Bohemian Rhapsody biopic<\/a>, were the highest \u201cGalileos,\u201d which only Taylor could manage. And the process did get to the drummer, who threw a tantrum that, if anything, is underplayed in the film, according to Langan. \u200a\u201cHe really did lose it,\u201d the engineer says. \u201cHe was furious. It was up a few notches from what you see in the movie.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tBesides that, the only real moments of tension had to do with the song\u2019s extravagant length for a single.\u200a\u201cYou had Fred, who was staunchly holding out for six minutes, of course,\u201d says Langan. \u201cAnd a faction of the band going, \u2018You know what, Fred? I think you\u2019ve gone one step too far here.\u2019\u201d Taylor even recalls Deacon attempting an edit, which didn\u2019t go over well with the others.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t\u00a0The band was concerned about their record label\u2019s reaction, but despite the movie\u2019s scene with a Myers cameo as a contemptuous exec, Reid insists there was no confrontation. \u201cThere were two or three promotion men subscribing to \u2018I\u2019d say it\u2019s way too long,\u2019\u201d he says. \u201cIn the end, they went with what we told them.\u201d Some of the strongest objections, in fact, came from Elton John. \u201cHe said, \u2018Are you fucking crazy?\u2019\u201d Reid recalls. \u201c\u2018That will never be a hit. It\u2019s too long!\u2019 He was adamant.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tThe band\u2019s final innovation was to record a music video for the song, a rare move in 1975. (Years later, a Wayne\u2019s World re-edit of the footage would relaunch the song in the United States.) They spent only four hours on it, at Elstree Studios, the same spot where much of Star Wars would shoot a year later. Taylor, again, didn\u2019t have much fun. \u201cI had to be stripped to the waist and covered in baby oil,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd it was, like, 1:30 in the morning.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tMay recorded all of the song\u2019s many layered guitar parts with his Red Special, the guitar he\u2019d built from scratch with his dad as a teenager, using wood from an antique fireplace. When he takes me by his home studio after we talk, I inquire about its whereabouts. \u201cOh, you wanna see?\u201d he asks, sending an employee off for it. When it arrives, moments later, May plays a few suspended chords, talking about the influence of the Who\u2019s Pete Townshend. \u201cShe\u2019s a good old friend,\u201d he says. Then he puts it in my hands. It\u2019s heavy with dense wood and the weight of history, but I dare to play the first few notes of the \u201cBohemian Rhapsody\u201d solo, feeling my fingers on the buttery fretboard in the exact spots May put them. May raises his eyebrows, and laughs. \u201cAh, good,\u201d he says. \u201cThat could work!\u201d<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tQueen at Ridge Farm, July 1975<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tWatal Asanuma\/Shinko Music\/Getty Images<\/p>\n \n\tSINCE 2011, QUEEN HAVE toured the world several times with Adam Lambert on vocals, and they have good news for their fans: \u201c\u200aI don\u2019t think we\u2019re done,\u201d says Taylor. \u201cAnd I don\u2019t think we\u2019re gonna say, you know, final farewell tour or whatever. \u2019Cause it never is, is it?\u201d They still haven\u2019t released new Queen music with Lambert, but May says that idea is \u201calways in the mind. Not many people know, but Adam and we have been in the studio trying things. Nothing really materialized so far. Some things are meant to be and some things are not.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tMay is weary of the road, but still wants to perform. \u201c\u200aI\u2019ve had 50 years of touring and there\u2019s a part of me that thinks it\u2019s enough,\u201d he says. \u201cI don\u2019t like the idea that you wake up in your hotel room and you\u2019re trapped. I had a few experiences recently where stuff happened at home with my family and I could not go home. It got under my skin and I just thought, \u2018I\u2019m not sure if I want this anymore.\u2019 I feel like I\u2019ve given up my freedom too many times. So my feeling at the moment is I don\u2019t want to tour as such. I still want to play shows. I still want to innovate.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tTo that end, May has his mind set on a Queen residency at the Sphere in Las Vegas, which awed him with its 360-degree screens and other tech innovations when he caught a gig there by some classic-rock peers. \u201c\u200aI\u2019m very keen on the Sphere,\u201d May says. \u201cIt\u2019s got my mind working. I sat there watching the Eagles, thinking, \u2018We should do this. The stuff that we could bring to this would be stupendous.\u2019 So, yeah, I would like to do it. We\u2019re having conversations.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tStill absent from those conversations is John Deacon. Always the quietest member of Queen, he retreated into a private life after Mercury\u2019s death; he hasn\u2019t given an interview in decades, and he doesn\u2019t speak to his bandmates at all, even socially. \u201cI \u200athink both Roger and I find it quite hard, but he doesn\u2019t want to and we have to respect that,\u201d May says. \u201cHe wants to be separate. He\u2019s still part of the destiny of the band, though. If we\u2019re trying to make business decisions, he\u2019s always consulted, but it happens through the management or through our accountant. We don\u2019t speak, which is a shame, but we do know that we have his blessing. That\u2019s important.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tMercury at Scorpio Sound studios in London in September, 1975<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tWatal Asanuma\/Shinko Music\/Getty Images<\/p>\n \n\tEven Mercury somehow feels more present in their lives.\u200a\u201cBrian and I often think he\u2019s in the room in the corner,\u201d says Taylor. \u201c\u2019Cause we know exactly what he\u2019d say and what he\u2019d think. Even though it was all those years ago now that we lost him.\u201d To this day, Mercury has a habit of popping up in May\u2019s dreams. \u201cIt\u2019s always very prosaic,\u201d he says. \u201cIt is never a surprise that he\u2019s there. I don\u2019t think \u2018You shouldn\u2019t be here.\u2019 It\u2019s just like he\u2019s part of my life, as he always was.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tMercury would sometimes echo his \u201cnothing really matters to me\u201d lyric by airily downplaying the importance of his music, \u00adclaiming none of it deserved to last, even \u201cBohemian Rhapsody.\u201d \u201cHe used to say, \u2018Oh, my art is like fish-and-chip paper,\u2019\u201d says May. \u201cYou remember that quote? He says, \u2018It is disposable.\u2019 But no, he didn\u2019t think so. Not really.\u201d He sighs aloud, thinking about his friend, and repeats his thought. \u201cNot Freddie.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\tTrending Stories<\/p>\n \t\tSenior writer BRIAN HIATT<\/a> interviewed James Gunn<\/a> for the July-August issue. He is the host of Rolling Stone Music Now<\/a>, available wherever you find podcasts.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"T heir real life was about to slip into fantasy, which was pretty much the plan. At the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":157526,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[67557,1005,96,1004,28571,128,1006,71923,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-157525","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-bohemian-rhapsody","9":"tag-brian-may","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-freddie-mercury","12":"tag-long-reads","13":"tag-music","14":"tag-queen","15":"tag-roger-taylor","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom","18":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157525"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157525\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/wp-content\/themes\/vip\/pmc-rollingstone-2022\/assets\/public\/lazyload-fallback.gif\")
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